


I Got You, Babe

by imwiththeunicorn (tiatodd)



Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-19
Updated: 2019-10-19
Packaged: 2020-12-23 23:34:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,860
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21089657
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tiatodd/pseuds/imwiththeunicorn
Summary: part of the 12 days of christmas fics I did that one time





	I Got You, Babe

“Five-O!”  
The words were barely out of Steve McGarrett’s mouth when the scruffy, lean man in a gray sweatshirt shot down the street on foot. Steve groaned, pinching the pressure from the bridge of his nose before charging after him, leaving Danny behind in the car.  
They run. Every. Time. Why.  
“Steve, you’re not gonna catch—ugh…” Danny rolled his eyes, muttering something as he threw the car in drive. He knew Steve _could_ catch the perpetrator, and in fact would. So why he insulted his own self-esteem by trying to head off the sleazy man with the car, he had no idea. He careened around the corner, skidding to a stop at the end of just the right alleyway. He got out of the car, cuffs on his hip, and for a moment he thought he might have actually been of use this time; because ass the man sprinted down the alley and hopped the chain link fence, looking everywhere but ahead of him, Danny could not see Steve on his tail.  
And there he was, a bit further behind than the Navy SEAL should have been. Danny stood ready, watching Steve gain on the runner…and then nearly fall off the top of the chain link fence. Nearly. But not a second later, he had the guy pinned to the brick wall, both of them huffing.  
“You alright, buddy?” asked Danny as he jogged toward them.  
“Yeh…book ‘em, Dann-o,” Steve panted. Coughed. Right in the pinned man’s face.  
“Augh, come on!”  
\--  
“I don’t have a cold,” Steve insisted.  
“Yes, you do, please pull over before you sneeze us off the road,” said Danny. “_Steve._ Buddy. Please. Your eyes are so red they’re making _mine_ itch, pull over and let me drive.”  
“I am one hundred percent fii-i-aaAHKTCHFBLEH--!”  
“STEVE!” was Danny’s verbal reaction as he gripped the seat tightly, heart rate speeding as Steve casually straightened out the car’s direction. “Okay. Did you see that? We almost drove into a palm tr—no, you didn’t see that, you know what? You didn’t see it because your eyes were closed because you were sneezing, _pull. Over._”  
Ever stubborn, Steve shook his head, about to protest again, and then his eye twitched and he sniffled, rubbing his nose with the back of his hand as another sneeze threatened to break his control. He flared his nostrils and sighed carefully, suppressing the sneeze, as he pulled over carefully and gave Danny a look of there-mother-are-you-happy-now.  
Danny replied to this nonverbal message with a smug and thankful nod as they both clicked their seatbelts and opened their doors. Danny walked around the front of the car to where Steve waited for him, holding the door open like a begrudging gentleman.  
“Thank you,” said the blond, taking his place behind the wheel with a teasing smirk.  
“Yeah, yeah, my eyes w’r getting tired anyway,” Steve mumbled, rubbing a hand over his scruffly chin.  
They started off back down the road, Danny checking on Steve out of the corner of his eye on occasion. “Look…khhh…I’ll help you get better ASAP, okay? Obviously having a cold is some sort of unknown horror to you so I’ll help you get through it quickly. You just have to trust me, alright?”  
“Yeah, yeah.”  
\--  
“This is what you’ve been drinkin’ lately?” asked Danny, pulling a half-empty six pack of Monster energy from the fridge and giving Steve a you-should-know-better-young-man eyebrow raise. “Is there anything else even in this fridge?”  
“What, so now you’re my dentist or someth—“  
“No, I’m your mother. Clearly. Steve…” His shoulder slumped with a heavy sigh as he hauled out the energy drinks. “No wonder you got sick so easily.”  
“Danny,” Steve started, getting up quickly from the table and swaying with a hint of dizziness. “Guh…Dan—Danny, where are you going with those? DANNY!”  
The smaller man was already opening the front door.  
“Danny!”  
And he was in the street, lifting the lid of a trash can. He raised his eyebrows and cheered the drinks in Steve’s direction, and then dropped them in to a groan from Steve. He quickly got over his momentary weakness, sighing tiredly and crossing his arms. “You owe me…seven dollars and twelve cents.”  
“Really? With the twelve cent—look, why did you even have those?  
Steve huffed. And then sniffled, wincing miserably at the tickle in the back of his nose. “I needed to stay up late to think through one of our recent cases…” Sniffle. “And so I got a couple, and then I got a little hooked, so.”  
“Steve…have you even slept? At all this month?”  
Steve opened his mouth, then closed it, then half-sideways-yeah-sure nodded. “Maybe not this pas _week,_ but…”  
Danny’s eyes widened, and then he pinched the bridge of his nose, and then he jabbed a hand toward Steve. “_You_ are how it is possible to catch a cold in Hawaii!”  
“It isn’t that big a deal…”  
“Yes it is, Steve, because knowing you it’ll turn into pneumonia and then it’ll turn into polio or something—“  
“You are such a mother.”  
“Get used to it,” said Danny, “because after I get your fridge re-filled I will be back to take care of you until you get better. And you are going to stay inside until I get back from the store.”  
“Danny, it’s a _cold_\--“  
“Inside, SEAL boy.”  
\--  
“Alright, then,” Steve muttered to himself, planting his ass on the couch and snuggling a pillow. He had no reason to defy Danny. Case was closed, he was already home, and the pressure in his sinuses didn’t exactly make him want to get up anyway. Aggravating Danny would only aggravate both of them and the opportunity cost was a bit high for a sick Steve. So he turned on the TV, and turned it off, and laid down into the couch and punched the cushions, and quickly decided screw Danny this was his own damn house.  
So he stood up, quickly, all the blood in his body rushing at once. He lost balance and stumbled back, vision blurring and spotting for an uncomfortable moment.  
“Guh,” he groaned in defeat, relinquishing his body to the soft cushions of the couch. He turned to face the back of it, nuzzling himself into the corner, and focused on trying to breathe somewhat comfortably through the congestion.  
By the time Danny got back, Steve was asleep. He hadn’t awoken when Danny opened the door, complaining loudly about the price of orange juice in Hawaii, or slamming his groceries down on the counter in the kitchen.  
“…and I don’t even want to _tell_ you about the guy at the pharmacy, I swear he w—“ Danny dropped silent, slowing his pace as he finally recognized Steve was asleep. And kind of snoring, a bit like Grace did when she would fall asleep on road trips. It was fucking cute.  
He crossed his arms and smiled to himself, leaning against the wall. “Will ya look at that. The invincible Steve McGarrrett, wiped out by a common cold.”  
Steve coughed in his sleep, tightening in on himself. He sniffed, and then coughed again. And then he coughed again, and tossed and spluttered for a second, sitting upright with a fit of coughs. Alarmed, Danny went to his side, patting his back. “Steve? You okay? Steve, breathe.”  
“I’m—HKKH!—fine, Danny—hhk, kkhh-khh!!”  
Danny spotted a glass of water on the coffee table. “Steve, here. Steve. Steve, drink.”  
Steve accepted the glass and tipped it into his mouth, much of the water tumbling down his chin and onto his shirt. He managed to swallow before he coughed again, and then he took more water a bit slower.  
He took a deep breath and hunched forward, shaking just a little.  
Danny watched close, worried. “You okay, Steve?”  
Steve held up a finger and then coughed once more, the sort of cough, which isn’t really a cough, but more like a burp that’s all air because you swallowed water too quickly and down the “wrong tube”.  
“I’m fine,” he said hoarsely, setting the glass on the table and looking down at his soaked shirt. “Wonderful.” He put a hand on the cushion behind him, raising his hips off the couch.  
“No no, don’t get up, I’ll get you a shirt.”  
“Danny. I can get myself a shirt.”  
“If you get up too fast, you _will_ fall over. I’ll be right back.”  
Steve glared half-heartedly at Danny and gave up, flopping back down on the couch.  
“You’re welcome,” Danny prompted disconsolately, leaving the room.  
“Thank you.”  
Danny made his way to Steve’s closet, removing from it a dark blue button-down shirt, the one that flattered Steve the most. Why did he even know that.  
“Here,” he said, tossing the shirt at Steve and heading into the kitchen. “Do you know,” he complained as he got down a glass, “_anyone_ in their right mind who would pay $7 for orange juice?”  
“Uh, yeah, anyone living in Hawaii who wants orange juice,” Steve replied, peeling off his wet shirt. Danny came in with a glass of juice, pausing for a little longer than he should have at the sight of Steve’s bare back.  
“Yeah, well, I’m not that desperate,” said Steve, setting the glass down on the coffee table as Steve put on the blue shirt. “So I got pineapple juice instead, it’s got ‘bout the same amount of vitamin C which is really—are you gonna just leave your shirt unbuttoned?”  
Steve ignored the question. “Pineapple juice?” he asked, a bemused expression crossing his face as he took a sip.  
“What? ‘S juice.”  
Steve continued to look at him with one eyebrow raised and the edge of his lips quirked up.  
“_What?_ Is that supposed to mean something?”  
Steve shook his head, smiling like he had a secret joke. Then his smile was interrupted by a grimace, and Steve’s eyes twitched closed and he sneezed. He ducked his head in a touch of embarrassment. “Thanks, Danny. You can…go now if you want.”  
“Go? Nuh-uh, I don’t trust you to take care of yourself.”  
“I’ll sleep or something. Go, I dunno, pick up Grace and have a father-daughter day or something…” He fended off a second sneeze, gulping down some of the pineapple juice.  
“Neither of us can do those things.”  
“Well okay, go…do something else, I dunno. But I can sleep.”  
Danny raised an eyebrow. “Sneezing and coughing.”  
“Yeah.”  
“Without any NyQuil.”  
Steve’s eyes shifted to the left. “Yeah.”  
“Yeah, good luck with that. Tell you what, if you can get yourself to sleep in the next five minutes, I’ll leave.”  
“Well fine.”  
“Good.”  
“Good.”  
“Fine.”  
“Go to sleep,” Danny said, leaving the room again. “Using your computer.”  
“Sure.”  
“I wasn’t asking.”  
“Tch.” Steve shook his head and smiled, laying back down and trying to get comfortable. As long as he could at least pretend to sleep, he’d be Danny-free the rest of the night. If he had wanted his mom to look after him, he would have just called her.  
Or maybe he would have let Danny take care of him.  
But he didn’t want to be mothered. So he tucked himself up into a ball and hugged a pillow to his chest, closing his eyes.  
He scrunched up his nose to try to get rid of a tickle. Ugh, just when he was getting comfortable. He buried his face in the pillow, very determined to not have to get up and get a box of tissues. He sniffed, groaned a little, and then he could feel the sneeze building in the back of his nose, like someone was tickling the back of his throat with a feather. “Hnnh…”  
Flaring his nostrils to suppress the sneeze, Steve shot up off the couch, going incredibly dizzy for a moment as he made for the kitchen. “Ah…nnh…” He couldn’t hold it off for much longer, eyes watering from the effort, and before he even left the room Danny was leaning in the doorway, holding out a tissue between his fore and middle fingers. Just in time. Steve snatched it up, tearing the corner, and clutched it to his nose. “Khhtchnghh!!”  
Wiping his nose and sniffing, he looked down at Danny and begrudged him permission to stay. “Thanks.”  
“Hey, I’m there for ya, babe,” said Danny, reaching up to pat his shoulder.  
“Yeah, yeah.” He took the box of tissues from Danny’s other hand and took his seat on the couch again, tossing the used tissue into a wastebasket. “So then since I can’t sleep. Wanna watch a movie or something?”  
“_Not_ the Notebook, that was torture.”  
“I told you,” Steve laughed as Danny took a seat next to him. “How ‘bout you pick one?” He motioned to a cabinet full of DVDs.  
“Alright, let’s see.” Danny couched down by the cabinet, running a finger over the spines of the DVD cases. “Ooh, I haven’t seen Back to the Future in forever. Classic.”  
“Right?”  
“Hmm…got a lotta Disney movies for a single guy with no kids.”  
“A lot of those are uh, Catherine’s,” Steve said defensively, taking another drink of juice. “So is She’s The Man.”  
“Mm. And Mean Girls?”  
“No, that one’s my mom’s.”  
Danny looked back at him inquisitively.  
“I lied, it’s mine. Would you hurry up and pick one?”  
“Yeah, yeah.” Saw…Scary Movie…Hot Rod…”Toy Story. You know, I’ve actually never seen this.”  
“Not even with Grace?”  
“Nah, her mother took her to see the third one but she apparently wasn’t into it.” Danny shrugged. “Oh, this one! I watched this with Grace once actually, she loved the big furry blue guy.” He held up Monsters Inc.  
“You really wanna watch a Pixar movie? Come on, anything else but some sappy—“  
“Come on, please?” He held the movie up to his chin and pouted. And pouted. And pouted. And crinkled his eyebrows—  
“Okay fine, put it in.”  
And so Danny obeyed, grabbing the remote and sitting down beside Steve again.  
“Was a fun night, though,” said Steve. “Halloween.”  
“Oh yeah. That was some choice cuddling.”  
“Yeap.”  
The introduction credits came on, shapes bouncing on the screen to the music. Danny snapped his fingers along. “I like this. This is catchy.”  
“Mmhm.”  
“Da, da da, da da da…” Danny hummed, receiving an amused smile from Steve. “But I wouldn’t have nothin’ if I didn’t have you.”  
“Aw, Danny, that’s so sweet,” Steve faux-gushed.  
“What? No, it’s the song…”  
“Mmhm, sure. You liked that cuddling more than you let on.” With that he draped his arm around Danny’s shoulders and Danny snuggled right up to the sick man, too quickly pushed away. “Sorry, I don’t wanna get you sick. My fault.”  
Danny wouldn’t have it, settling back into position. “You know colds are only contagious in the few days before you show symptoms, right?”  
“Really? That’s inconvenient. Well, actually, it’s a bit more convenient now than a few days ago.” Snuggle.  
Danny looked up at Steve’s face; his eyes all red and bothered, his nose pinkish and a little swollen, his lips parted to breathe a little easier. It was adorably vulnerable. He stayed fixated on Steve’s lips awhile, only listening to the movie.  
Thank God Steve sneezed then. Really, thank God, because if he hadn’t sneezed Danny would have gotten around to thinking about how kissable those lips were. But he didn’t get to that thought because right as he prepared to, licking his own lips, Steve nictated and sneezed, body lurching forward and disturbing the cuddling.  
“I’b sorry,” he rasped, grasping a tissue to his nose. “Bghuh…”  
“Dude, don’t apologize. You’re sick,” said Danny, settling awkwardly against the back of the couch. Cue that awkward moment in which one doesn’t know whether to resume cuddling. “Want me to get you somethin’?”  
Steve quirked an eyebrow as he threw the tissue away, smiling secretively again. “Some more of that pineapple juice would be nice.”  
“I still don’t get it,” Danny said, rising from the couch with Steve’s empty glass. When he came back with it refilled, Steve was stretched out over the couch on his back, looking expectantly at Danny like a cat waiting to be petted. “Cute.” He set the glass on the coffee table and sat down in a chair, folding his arms.  
“Hey, we can still cuddle if you wanna,” said Steve.  
Danny’s eyes widened and he looked back at Steve. “Uhm, I don’t think layin’ on top of you sounds like a great idea. I’m sorry, I know you want me, but…”  
“Tch.” Steve sat up again, taking a sip of the juice as he patted the seat beside him. “Thanks.”  
“For what?” He plopped down next to his friend again, giving in to the coaxing arm around his shoulder. “It’s juice.”  
“Not for the juice. For…caring. I guess.” He looked at the blond under his arm with unveiled sincerity, a smile growing into his cheeks.  
“Oh, don’t. You know you’re the only person I could call a close friend.” He snuggled into Steve even more. “Can’t help but care about you.”


End file.
